Zubaty, like Quinn and Rowden, believe that society is a mess because of female influence, including that men who mess up are doing so because they are feminine-minded. He does, though, admit that he is basically "just venting" when he says all that. I kind of get the impression that is basically what David, Dan, and Kevin do with the Woman philosophy as well, but none of these guys seem to be able to judge the difference between healthy venting and fueling the fires of prejudice.

That's also what the radio priest thought - that I was simply venting against Christianity. He thought I was being unkind and unfair to all the Christians out there.

Interestingly, my approach to the issue of woman is more or less identical to my approach to Christianity. The same motivation, purpose, and methodology is in play. The same use of generalizations, strong concepts, blunt words, and pointing beyond. The same cut-to-the-chase approach.

A Christian might object to my methods and say that Christians come in all shapes and sizes. There are good and bad Christians, he might say, just as there are intelligent and unintelligent, kind and unkind, honest and dishonest ones. And he would be absolutely right. And yet, in saying this, he completely misses the point.

Someone recently asked me what peace would be like, if peace alone would make everything okay, and reflected a question that I have asked myself about whether or not people really want peace. The whole answer to just "what would peace be like" would take a book, but I answered with a few specifics that were asked of me. I thought I'd share the answer with you as well:

There is a difference between a peaceful existence and a banal existence. There would still be pains, such as the loss of loved ones. There may or may not be disease as we shift our resources into improving lives rather than to efforts of war. There are enough resources on this planet for everyone if we could only get the balance right, so hunger is an unnecessary pain. People do not mean to overeat nor do they like the results of overeating, and the pain of hunger for those who have overeaten is at least as bad as the pain of hunger of those who don't have enough to eat. Of those whose pain is from not having enough to feed their children, that is unnecessary. Overpopulation would not be a problem either if only those who really wanted children for the right reasons had children, rather than just because they thought that was what they were supposed to do, or even worse because they get a bigger welfare check if they have more children.

There may be a time and a place to let out aggressions (some people get into S & M, some people like to wrestle, some people like some vicious debates) and that could be okay as long as it didn't really hurt anybody and didn't interfere with real progress. It's when politicians cease doing their job of helping the societies that elected them because they'd rather have a verbal brawl that they're only in to win rather than see whole problem and thoughtfully and open-mindedly consider workable solutions.

War is not good, and it doesn't achieve the results the instigators want (and both sides invariably believe the other side started it). What's the idea behind war anyway? Kill off as many people as it takes to make the leader do what the other leader wants? If the problem is that one leader thinks the other leader is cold-hearted and unreasonable and he really is those things, is he going to care how many of "his" people that the other leader has his people kill off? And its "okay" to kill soldiers, but not okay to send in an assassin to kill off the leader of the other nation? Who made up these rules? If the leaders could be in as much personal risk, would they be so willing to go to war rather than work out the differences? It isn't okay to kill anybody unless it is totally unavoidable, and people seem to have a funny idea about what "unavoidable" means. All war, or any other kind of serious violence does is stir up hatred and anger, and waste resources that could be going to make the whole world a better place for everyone.

Okay, sometimes a mentally unwell person has risen to power. The obvious answer is to have gotten the unwellness recognized and taken care of before things got that far. If all people were mentally healthier, Hitler would never have gassed one person. People would have recognized that there was something wrong, and at the very least, not gone along with it. Of course it takes guts to do the right thing when your job is on the line few can currently do that even when it is a very low-stakes job. Getting everybody okay (healthy mentally, physically, and spiritually) will reflect throughout society even in the leaders.

So what is one country to do when another country really is being led by a madman, and the results are intolerable? Show the people around the leaders what the madness is, and let them take care of it. If the people ask for help, then come in and remove the problem. Otherwise, people don't like invaders coming in and trying to take over even if they are only trying to "keep the peace." Peace can't be kept at gunpoint.

Peace = freedom + responsibility.

It's a basic truism that if people were mentally healthier, then their actions will be less insane and destructive. So I can agree there. But I can't really discern any other coherent ideas in your piece there. It's all a bit too vague for my liking.

What does it mean to be mentally healthy, for example? What does peace really mean? Does it mean being tolerant and accepting of little wars? Is it really possible to have "loved ones" and no violence and war? Even the very term "loved one" itself has violent undertones. And so on.

Ideally, peace should only erupt between Buddhas. When there is peace, or at least some semblance of it, between deluded people, then it simply means that they are sharing the same deluded beliefs and values. Or else they are temporarily too exhausted to fight.

David Quinn wrote:Women (i.e. those who mentally women) are unconscious in a very different way to men. As a rule, the masculine mind is very coherent and structured. It possesses the memory and consistency required to apply logic to any area of life and discern truth there. However, because men still have egos, and therefore fears and attachments, they are usually loathe to apply logic in those dangerous areas which potentially threaten their attachments. And so they engage in all sorts of mental trickery to cope. They erect mental blocks, develop the habit of short-circuiting their reasoning powers before they go too far, distract themselves, become obsessive about trivial matters, and so on. In other words, their lack of consciousness is ultimately a product of fear.

The feminine mind, by contrast, is incoherent and unstructured. It flows along aimlessly, moving from one ill-conceived thought to another, lacking the memory and consistency to apply logic in any one direction for long, unable to really progress or understand anything at all. Whatever knowledge-structures it does possess are merely echoes of what is been fed into it by other people, by society as a whole. The lack of consciousness in this case is the result of mental incapacity.

...This is why I have concluded that women have no potential for wisdom at all. There simply isn't enough mental capacity there to take the initiative and follow a line of thought to the very end and be changed by it. The flow is too unstructured and aimless.

These differences don't mean that the feminine-minded can't learn and retain information. Most of what is learned by masculine and feminine minds both happens on an unconscious level. Logical thinkers examine concepts and theorize solutions, but it's still the experience of the applied solution that ultimately teaches them. Feminine thinkers may be less sequential in their reasoning, but they are still accessing information just as valid as logical thought. Look at how women are knowledgeable about psychology without actually understanding it. They can just tell certain things. Or how they can mediate between people and resolve conflicts in the best interest of everyone involved (kids, anyone?). They didn't learn all of that by studying. It was experience that taught them.

David Quinn wrote:To correct a misconception frequently uttered by Elizabeth and Laird, I don't actually equate unconsciousness with femininity.

In his Woman book, David Quinn wrote:I put it to you that everything a woman does obstructs the growth of wisdom.

and

In his Woman book, David Quinn wrote:Woman is the embodiment of delusion;

which is only slightly different by what, on the bottom of page 7,

Dan Rowden wrote:No, we conflate all that is unconscious with the feminine.

Nice "we" there. Are you directly refuting Dan's "we" on that belief? And the difference between unconsciousness and the embodiment of delusion, and "everything a woman does obstructs the growth of wisdom."

David Quinn wrote:What does it mean to be mentally healthy, for example? What does peace really mean? Does it mean being tolerant and accepting of little wars? Is it really possible to have "loved ones" and no violence and war? Even the very term "loved one" itself has violent undertones. And so on.

I agree that the little article was, by necessity of length, vague. I also believe that my writing skills have improved since then. As far as a better and more complete answer, I'm going to have to ask you to wait until I have completed my book.

David Quinn wrote:To correct a misconception frequently uttered by Elizabeth and Laird, I don't actually equate unconsciousness with femininity. Unconsciousness can, and does, occur in both masculine and feminine-minded people. However, and this is critical to understanding the woman issue, the nature of this unconsciousness is vastly different in each case.

I don't think I agree with this but the problem could simply be in the wording. I'm inclined to agree with Elizabeth that what is behind what is being said still boils down to a conflation of the feminine and unconsciousness.

Women (i.e. those who mentally women) are unconscious in a very different way to men.

I agree with that in the sense of there being a difference in how it's produced much of the time. But I would still say that the actual unconsciousness in each case is the feminine.

As a rule, the masculine mind is very coherent and structured. It possesses the memory and consistency required to apply logic to any area of life and discern truth there. However, because men still have egos, and therefore fears and attachments, they are usually loathe to apply logic in those dangerous areas which potentially threaten their attachments. And so they engage in all sorts of mental trickery to cope. They erect mental blocks, develop the habit of short-circuiting their reasoning powers before they go too far, distract themselves, become obsessive about trivial matters, and so on. In other words, their lack of consciousness is ultimately a product of fear.

Men create mental blocks to stop the masculine from seeping more deeply into their experience. But only a somewhat masculine mind can or will do this. Women, unless they happen to be of such a mind, don't have mental blocks. There's not much there [of masculinity] to block out. Women are beset with anxieties, but that's not generally one of them. But I don't think we can say that a man's unconsciousness is entirely about such psychological game-play, or necessarily even largely about it. The average man simply has a strong feminine component to his mind and is therefore largely unconscious. When and if the masculine component gets a look-in, he will begin the processes of which you speak. I think there a threshold for this whereby a man ceases to be able to make use of these techniques and mental blocks and this is where genuine thought begins.

So, basically my way of expressing this point would be that men tend to be a causal component in their own overall state of unconsciousness, but to me that actual unconsciousness is still the feminine mode of engagement with reality.

"We can observe some of the differences between these two modes of consciousness on this forum. Consider Alex Jacob, for example, who I consider to be fairly masculine. His thought-processes are very consistent, structured and layered. They display a lot of irony and reflective humour. Although he is unconscious in a deeper sense - because of attachments, fears, mental blocks, etc - his mind is still multi-dimensional and has a lot of quality to it. He has the capacity to comprehend ultimate truth if he were to apply himself."

(*Snif*, really?)

I am a manly-man I tell you! I am capable of awareness as yet undreamed! Even if I was raised in the busom of the Celestial Vagina Coalition. Thing is, if I'm gonna join your cult I require a position at the top with full hire and fire authority. Alright, if you must know, I am only half Jewish and me own pop, bless is departed soul, was a Viking, so I know how to club a woman, throw her onto the boat, and beat a hasty retreat. Okay, this is not a skill you immediately require, what with your Christian-sage-in-the desert-trip and some kind of attraction to people's dogs, but things change with time they way I sees it, an' some day you might come back to the temple of the Great Mother where all her marvellous daughters serve Her in sexy undergarments, and when you do I assure you my skills will be valuable to you. You will be happy you did not jettison me from the Boat of Truth! True, I am unconscious at a deeper level, and don't apply myself to realization of the Ultimate Truth, but I know how to make an excellent rigatoni con salsa aurora, with traces of nutmeg, that is a sort of bubbling browned cheesy Ding an sich that produces at least a temporal enlightenment...and while meandering toward the Ultimate, my mammy always said, there is no harm meandering on a full stomach.

Dearest Floridian psychologists and Tazmanian hippies! Nice to have spent time with you, it was a swell ride, but now---destiny calls!

You're right, actually. Posting on messageboards is, in general, a very feminine activity. It is very passive and probably doesn't truly qualify as activity. Reading and frequently posting our personal opinions is, to say the least, a very secondhand way of experiencing life. Most of the males here can accurately be described as girly-men, and the women are chiefly men wannabes. Funny if you think about it.

Here come the questions: doesn't that make you a girly man, and, what are you doing here. Before you throw it in my face, look at yourself.

You're right, actually. Posting on messageboards is, in general, a very feminine activity. It is very passive and probably doesn't truly qualify as activity. Reading and frequently posting our personal opinions is, to say the least, a very secondhand way of experiencing life. Most of the males here can accurately be described as girly-men, and the women are chiefly men wannabes. Funny if you think about it.

Here come the questions: doesn't that make you a girly man, and, what are you doing here. Before you throw it in my face, look at yourself.

Many times, having a discussion on a message board can actually be more effective than communicating in person because it gives you more time to think about the topic of discussion, and as a result the response usually ends up being of much higher quality than real-time discussion.

I donâ€™t see much difference between discussions in person, and discussions over the internet, both are merely an exchange of ideas and attempts to convey truth if done correctly. And discussion in general is not a feminine activity, as long as the parties involved are exploring the deepest philosophical issues.

Moreover, I canâ€™t think of anything more active and masculine than criticizing the quality of someoneâ€™s thoughts whether it be in person, on the computer, or what have you.

Actually Carl, your above opinion is rather feminine, meaning it doesnâ€™t reflect how things actually are, so I can see why you might think that posting opinions on messageboards is rather feminine, and a waste of timeâ€¦ ; )

"Here come the questions: doesn't that make you a girly man, and, what are you doing here. Before you throw it in my face, look at yourself."

Humor, especially from someone you don't know, is certainly difficult to read (interpret). My sense is that most people here have little or no sense of humor, always an alarm bell to my way of seeing things. Humorless people, I have noticed, will often project onto humorousness all kinds of dark material. I have no idea if that is the case with you, but I have absolutely no intention of doing harm to you or anyone on any level, so I am not sure why you'd think I'd 'throw a rock'.

I do like the question though, it is one that everyone should answer, in all contexts. I'll do my best to tell you why I am here. It is a little complex so bear with me.

Some impressions:

Maybe it is because of what our culture has become (the US---I haven't been in Europe in years so can't speak about it). Over the last 10-15 years I have witnessed a transformation that I really can no longer bear. I don't want to live here anymore. Just walking down the street, in the supermarkets, in public, listening to people, I see things that make me 'sick to my stomach'.

To be quite truthful---though it is difiicult to talk about with objectivity---it really DOES seem to me that the civil culture is in so many ways essentially female, run by women, dominated by women's values and attitudes, but these are not the women I admire or respect, I don't know how else to put it. I don't know what to make of that. To be truthful---and again it is difficult for me to assess my own objectivity because these observations do hinge on feelings, on senses, and are not only intellectual---if I had to say it, I really feel I have so very little left in common with my own culture, and with many people of that culture. What 'they' have become I never, ever want to be, and I don't think I am. I have spent my life living very individualistically, and that is not something I just say because I like the ring of it, it is very true. Fact is, I have sacrificed so much of the traditional (relationship, wife, kids, house, the whole incredible scene that all this entails and much more too) to that pursuit of individuality, of personal dreams, of freedom, that at times it has been very painful to live in the loneliness that results from this. There is a real discomfort, something visceral, when you take stock of what you have given up.

Well, that is one of the things I have come to realize more acutely since I found my way to this forum, which was by strange turns, because you are a strange lot I suppose. Y'all seem to couch it all in grandiose terms---that you are pursuing 'grand realizations' and 'ultimate freedom' and 'enlightenment'. I don't buy too much of this even for one second since I think that 'enlightenment' is never something to be talked about, and what it is is not at all what people seem to think it is, but there, I commit the error of talking about it. But I have realized, more clearly, that I have spent 20 years of my life...in pursuit of myself...and interestingly, very interestingly, what I have sacrificed along that road...is a longterm relationship with a woman (to state it basically).

I guess that means marriage and kids and all that goes along with that. I always thought that I wanted that---her, that special someone---but recently I learned that I really didn't! I really wanted something else altogether. It is a peculiar place to be in, very peculiar, to see that you lived in a certain way so as to never sacrifice your core freedom, but you couldn't quite state it in those terms, but now you can state it in those terms, and you see all that you have 'lost', but also all that you have gained, and maintained, and developed. And 'the other people', they look at times like infants! (I see that sometimes and don't know what to make of it).

I had a breakup with someone I cared for a great deal. This was just a year ago now, in South America. The ffects were very wide-ranging. (I have another GF now). In taking a stand against immaturity and (you guys might appreciate this) a kind of self-centeredness and spoiledness in the person I was with, I effectively caused the relationship to end, but this was not at all what I wanted or thought I wanted. And I had to see that I did it, I produced this result, a bitter pill to swollow. The long and the short of it was that it produced a great deal of anger...anger that I have not completely gotten to the bottom of (and may never), but it seems to be a similar anger to some of the anger some men express on this list. But anger toward what? Toward whom?

It is 'multivalent' the feelings and thoughts I have about this, it is not just one thing, it can't be discided so easily. Psychologically, truth be told, I feel a little drawn to some of the outright misogyny that is expressed by some on this list, and that is exactly what it is. On the other hand, I think that there is a significant portion of this anger or discontent that is...while not justified perhaps explainable, with reason. I think it is true, despite what any woman may say, that only a man can tell you the truth about a woman, and women. Ha! But maybe the inverse is true too: maybe only a woman can tell you the real truth about a man, and men? Anyway, I thought I'd find like minds here but what I find is a kind of 'sickness', some men who seem in some ways to be missing the boat, and investing in their neurosis even as they call it something else. Since I certainly don't want to take steps backwards that all has to be resisted, sorted through, and more than anything avoided.

'Spritual life'---what is it? What does that even mean? I don't think that hardly anyone really knows, and most of the time it seems to me that people are just 'investing in their neurotic trips', and in the end, avoiding life, saying 'no' to life. I don't want to go that route of course.

Knwoledge is power, certainly, freedom from illusion is tremendous power. But so few really seem to understand what any of that really means, and there are so many charlatans and cheaters out there. You can pretty much figure that if someone is trying to put their spiel on you, they are conning you, lying to you, trying to trip you up in their stumbling blocks. Isn't that true?

Y'all seem to think yo know what the pursuit of truth is, you've got it all worked out, you've even got books written on the subject---websites! Podcasts! Not to minimize your efforts, some part of them (some part of all efforts) are sincere no doubt. I guess I just think your nomenclature is fucked up. You're mystified, you don't know what end is up, you don't know who you really are, and you haven't the foggiest idea where you are going or where you're supposed to go...or do you?

Alex Jacob wrote:"Here come the questions: doesn't that make you a girly man, and, what are you doing here. Before you throw it in my face, look at yourself."

Humor, especially from someone you don't know, is certainly difficult to read (interpret). My sense is that most people here have little or no sense of humor, always an alarm bell to my way of seeing things. Humorless people, I have noticed, will often project onto humorousness all kinds of dark material. I have no idea if that is the case with you, but I have absolutely no intention of doing harm to you or anyone on any level, so I am not sure why you'd think I'd 'throw a rock'.

The remark "here come the questions" was actually not aimed at you, but at some of the others here who tend to sling defensively without thinking.

I do like the question though, it is one that everyone should answer, in all contexts. I'll do my best to tell you why I am here. It is a little complex so bear with me.

Some impressions:

Maybe it is because of what our culture has become (the US---I haven't been in Europe in years so can't speak about it). Over the last 10-15 years I have witnessed a transformation that I really can no longer bear. I don't want to live here anymore. Just walking down the street, in the supermarkets, in public, listening to people, I see things that make me 'sick to my stomach'.

I know what you mean, which incidentally makes me wonder why some posters are defending the idea in another thread, that humanity and its culture is not currently in decline.

To be quite truthful---though it is difiicult to talk about with objectivity---it really DOES seem to me that the civil culture is in so many ways essentially female, run by women, dominated by women's values and attitudes, but these are not the women I admire or respect, I don't know how else to put it.

Unfortunately it is all too easy to slap the 'feminine' label on the problem. At best this could suffice as a symptom, and even at that, I don't feel it is accurate. But go on.

I don't know what to make of that. To be truthful---and again it is difficult for me to assess my own objectivity because these observations do hinge on feelings, on senses, and are not only intellectual---if I had to say it, I really feel I have so very little left in common with my own culture, and with many people of that culture. What 'they' have become I never, ever want to be, and I don't think I am. I have spent my life living very individualistically, and that is not something I just say because I like the ring of it, it is very true.

Fact is, I have sacrificed so much of the traditional (relationship, wife, kids, house, the whole incredible scene that all this entails and much more too) to that pursuit of individuality, of personal dreams, of freedom, that at times it has been very painful to live in the loneliness that results from this. There is a real discomfort, something visceral, when you take stock of what you have given up.

It is called conscious suffering, and it is better in the long run, for someone of your temperament, than conscious slavery, or worse, unconscious suffering.

Well, that is one of the things I have come to realize more acutely since I found my way to this forum, which was by strange turns, because you are a strange lot I suppose.

It took seeing all the other strange folk to realize you are also strange? All right.

Y'all seem to couch it all in grandiose terms---that you are pursuing 'grand realizations' and 'ultimate freedom' and 'enlightenment'.

But, realization, freedom, and illumination ARE grandiose, in that they are far beyond ordinary experience. No two ways about it, they are far removed from that life that so disgusts you on the street, the experiences of, you might say, your own ordinary self.

I don't buy too much of this even for one second since I think that 'enlightenment' is never something to be talked about, and what it is is not at all what people seem to think it is, but there, I commit the error of talking about it.

There is a grain of truth to this. It is usually better to internalize rather than externalize, and yet there are times to talk of it, too.

But I have realized, more clearly, that I have spent 20 years of my life...in pursuit of myself...and interestingly, very interestingly, what I have sacrificed along that road...is a longterm relationship with a woman (to state it basically).

I guess that means marriage and kids and all that goes along with that. I always thought that I wanted that---her, that special someone---but recently I learned that I really didn't!

This sounds like a good realization for you, for now.

I really wanted something else altogether. It is a peculiar place to be in, very peculiar, to see that you lived in a certain way so as to never sacrifice your core freedom, but you couldn't quite state it in those terms, but now you can state it in those terms, and you see all that you have 'lost', but also all that you have gained, and maintained, and developed.

You have been able to gift yourself significantly, and this is no small beginning.

And 'the other people', they look at times like infants! (I see that sometimes and don't know what to make of it).

This is because you are working on evolving.

I had a breakup with someone I cared for a great deal. This was just a year ago now, in South America. The ffects were very wide-ranging. (I have another GF now). In taking a stand against immaturity and (you guys might appreciate this) a kind of self-centeredness and spoiledness in the person I was with, I effectively caused the relationship to end, but this was not at all what I wanted or thought I wanted. And I had to see that I did it, I produced this result, a bitter pill to swollow. The long and the short of it was that it produced a great deal of anger...anger that I have not completely gotten to the bottom of (and may never), but it seems to be a similar anger to some of the anger some men express on this list. But anger toward what? Toward whom?

Anger at falling in the trap yet again? (or is your current girlfriend situation different).

It is 'multivalent' the feelings and thoughts I have about this, it is not just one thing, it can't be discided so easily. Psychologically, truth be told, I feel a little drawn to some of the outright misogyny that is expressed by some on this list, and that is exactly what it is. On the other hand, I think that there is a significant portion of this anger or discontent that is...while not justified perhaps explainable, with reason. I think it is true, despite what any woman may say, that only a man can tell you the truth about a woman, and women. Ha! But maybe the inverse is true too: maybe only a woman can tell you the real truth about a man, and men?

You have many feelings about all of this, to sort out.

Anyway, I thought I'd find like minds here but what I find is a kind of 'sickness', some men who seem in some ways to be missing the boat, and investing in their neurosis even as they call it something else.

Such is life, but you can learn to separate the wheat from the chaff, an important skill as few things come pure.

Since I certainly don't want to take steps backwards that all has to be resisted, sorted through, and more than anything avoided.

Proper resistance and prudent avoidance are good skills, too.

'Spritual life'---what is it? What does that even mean? I don't think that hardly anyone really knows, and most of the time it seems to me that people are just 'investing in their neurotic trips', and in the end, avoiding life, saying 'no' to life. I don't want to go that route of course.

Knwoledge is power, certainly, freedom from illusion is tremendous power. But so few really seem to understand what any of that really means, and there are so many charlatans and cheaters out there. You can pretty much figure that if someone is trying to put their spiel on you, they are conning you, lying to you, trying to trip you up in their stumbling blocks. Isn't that true?

As you improve your ability to glean, these issues will clarify.

And, it's best to not worry about others; it will only sap your strength.

Y'all seem to think yo know what the pursuit of truth is, you've got it all worked out, you've even got books written on the subject---websites! Podcasts!

There technically is no group here to which "y'all" can be applied.

Not to minimize your efforts, some part of them (some part of all efforts) are sincere no doubt. I guess I just think your nomenclature is fucked up.

I would agree that it could be better.

For examples I think the definitions of "feminine" and "Enlightenment" could use some work vis a vis generally accepted meanings. Might lessen confusion to construct other words for those two meanings as they are used here.

You're mystified, you don't know what end is up, you don't know who you really are, and you haven't the foggiest idea where you are going or where you're supposed to go...or do you?

It is possible to be mystified and yet not feel mystified, true, but that is for each person to ascertain for his or her self.

Alex Jacob wrote:My sense is that most people here have little or no sense of humor, always an alarm bell to my way of seeing things.

Perhaps you're taking certain writings way too seriously or one-sided. Even underlying the harshest criticism you could find the gentlest smile and mockery. It's educational to see how the ones with the most superficial understanding of humor and philosophy talk about a falling apart or some drama play of the 'QRS' lately. That doesn't make it all into an act, not a make-belief, it's dead serious after all, but shows a willingness to shake up and disturb the dust, as a gesture of compassion and honesty. When the foundation is strong and unmovable, how could everything else be anything other than play? The stakes can be high though from a certain perspective.

Alex Jacob wrote:Some impressions:

Alex, those impressions will be very familiar to some here, I'm sure. How weird that such individualistic experiences can become in themselves almost ordinary and run-off-the-mill in other contexts. At least it kills off the "I'm so freaking special and unique" fantasy, however crucial and important such idea can be.

Y'all seem to couch it all in grandiose terms---that you are pursuing 'grand realizations' and 'ultimate freedom' and 'enlightenment'.

You'll get used to it. What prevented you to think grand? Didn't you ever got lured into pride and hubris, never experimented with a delusional idea of being a savior, superhero, prophet, alien or god? Not even a little bit? While hubris might be the greatest fall down, without thinking and desiring big, using perhaps some heavy wording, nothing of value will be accomplished. Remember that smallness in act and print is the iron rule of this day and age.

Anyway, I thought I'd find like minds here but what I find is a kind of 'sickness', some men who seem in some ways to be missing the boat, and investing in their neurosis even as they call it something else. Since I certainly don't want to take steps backwards that all has to be resisted, sorted through, and more than anything avoided.

There's a lot of sickness to get through to get to any real sanity. Not everyone makes it.

'Spritual life'---what is it? What does that even mean? I don't think that hardly anyone really knows, and most of the time it seems to me that people are just 'investing in their neurotic trips', and in the end, avoiding life, saying 'no' to life. I don't want to go that route of course.

Same with 'sanity', 'consciousness', 'life' or anything really. And since hardly (?) anyone really knows what life is about, it's a bit far fetched to think in terms of 'avoiding life'. I mean: what exactly is being avoided unless you've got a real clue about life, and as such 'spiritual life', which could be said to be life without the 'unspiritual' - without the delusion. Nothing more.

You're mystified, you don't know what end is up, you don't know who you really are, and you haven't the foggiest idea where you are going or where you're supposed to go...or do you?

Personally I think I've a pretty good idea but I also realized it's not what most people are looking for at all, since it doesn't provide as such a place to go or any particular activity to do.

"Unfortunately it is all too easy to slap the 'feminine' label on the problem. At best this could suffice as a symptom, and even at that, I don't feel it is accurate."

I see it like this: Over the last 2 decades, with the putsch of the business class in the 80s overturning almost any sense of other alternatives (all that came out of the 60s and so much of 'civil America'), America is now a giant corporation, and corporate ethics and values rein. What this corporate structure wants, more than kust about anything, is willing participants, willing subjects, pliant subjects, and you basically get what you ask for, you get what you create. Additionally, after over 100 years of the most intense psychological marketing efforts in history (it was all invented here), what we see now is a more or less malleable population who have been well trained for their 'servant' role. In this specific sense, into this structure, some aspect of the doctrines of feminism was coopted by the system, the corporate system and the governmental system, as was the civil rights movement, at least to some degree.

What I see, but I realize it is problematic and not really fair to women, is a general population that has surrendered to a role that has been established for it, and in that sense it is a 'yin' role, and (I sort of hate to say it but it is what I think, at least at this moment), you more or less breed out of your population those qualities traditionally associated with 'masculinity'. There is no place, or a restricted place, for that sort of masculinity, and oddly enough you seem to end up with 'feminine' men, or a sort of androgynous corporate type.

That is sort of a nutshell version of what I think of this improper characterization of the 'feminine' as unconscious.

"It took seeing all the other strange folk to realize you are also strange?"

No, it is the way these issues are presented in this context that have caused me to examine or reexamine myself. Being on this list is part of an educational project I have undertaken, which includes reading the original texts of feminism, looking into some biological and evolutionary studies, determining what is or should be the practice of religion and 'spirituality', and what is required to be free, if only mentally. The issue of freedom is paramount, and in my way of seeing things it comes mostly through reasoning processes, and through familiarilty with (mostly) the Western canon. Maybe in this sense I am in agreement with the Great Ones QRS (*genuflections, obeisances*). They may be right that an over-feminized type is a false creation, and certainly a product of 'false consciousness', but (and thank God for this) the female type is part and parcel of the very structure of things. But the 'male mind' is the defining mind.

In the end, as I see it, the real question is What is required to really be a man? That is where the difficulties start. You know, chinese wisdom says 'when the man is truly a man, and the woman a woman, then the family is put in order, and when the family is put in order, the world is put in order'. Also, that the 'place' of the women is 'within...attending to the sacrificial fires'. I don't say that I accept what this seems to indicate (women at home), and I believe the ramifications of it are far greater. To ask what is required to fulfil one's role as a man is also to imply that men have been very remiss in their responsibilities, as I see things.

In short, all of it is stuff worthy of consideration.

"But, realization, freedom, and illumination ARE grandiose, in that they are far beyond ordinary experience."

It depends on what you are referring to by these terms. As I see things, they are generally completely misunderstood, and whole generations of 'seekers' have gone off in search of illusions, take for example Castaneda and his inner circle, many of whom I have had contact with. It is a marvellous story, a fantastic and exciting narrative, but what is required to live out one's incarnation within the context of that incarnation, fulfilling one's responsibilities? I don't at all buy this separate yourself from the company of women spiel. One has got to learn how to handle life, and part of this (sorry ladies) is learning how to handle women, not run from them.

One has got to learn how to handle life, and part of this (sorry ladies) is learning how to handle women, not run from them.

No, there is nothing about 'handling' life which requires an intimate relationship with a woman. And women in non-intimate relationship are really not a problem, are they. What a man must ultimately handle, if he wishes to be free, are his own tendencies to be owned by the female mystique, and the root of it -- the abysmal education of parents, peers, and the insidious media -- most of all his own hormonal pulls.

The rest of your musings, while somewhat interesting, are rather vague.

Alex Jacob wrote:I see it like this: Over the last 2 decades, with the putsch of the business class in the 80s overturning almost any sense of other alternatives (all that came out of the 60s and so much of 'civil America'), America is now a giant corporation, and corporate ethics and values rein. What this corporate structure wants, more than kust about anything, is willing participants, willing subjects, pliant subjects, and you basically get what you ask for, you get what you create. Additionally, after over 100 years of the most intense psychological marketing efforts in history (it was all invented here), what we see now is a more or less malleable population who have been well trained for their 'servant' role.

I can see the argument made by Zubaty of corportization having some matriarchal aspects but the alternative offered thus far by the 'left' seems to me even more feminine.Marxism,Fabianism, Political Correctness,Statism,Post Modernism.It just appears so nuturing to me.Dare i use the cliche the 'nanny state'

It has always suprised me to find how many Nieztsche fans are 'of the left'.

To me this is a direct sledge at the likes of Hegel and Marx.(I think it may have even been posted a few weeks back in the main forum)

Quote:

Beyond Good and Evil44.

To put the matter briefly and seriously, they belong with the levellers, these falsely named "free spirits"â€”as eloquent and prolific writers, slaves of democratic taste and its "modern ideas": collectively people without solitude, coarse brave lads whose courage or respectable decency should not be denied. But they are unfree and ridiculously superficialâ€”above all with their basic tendency to see in the forms of old societies up to now the cause for almost every human misery and failure, a process which turns the truth happily on its head!

What they would like to strive for with all their powers is the universal green-pasture happiness of the herd, with security, absence of danger, comfort, an easing of life for everyone. The two songs and doctrines they sing most frequently are called "Equality of Rights" and "compassion for all things that suffer"â€”and they assume that suffering itself is something that we must do away with.

We who are their opposites, we who have opened our eyes and conscience for the question where and how up to now the plant "Man" has grown most powerfully to a height, we think that this has happened every time under the opposite conditions, that for that to happen the danger of his situation first had to grow enormously, his power of invention and pretence (his "spirit") had to develop under lengthy pressure and compulsion into something refined and audacious, his will for living had to intensify all the way into an unconditional will for power.

Too bad the German students chose Hegel lectures over Schopenhauers, I reckons.

One has got to learn how to handle life, and part of this (sorry ladies) is learning how to handle women, not run from them.

What a man must ultimately handle, if he wishes to be free, are his own tendencies to be owned by the female mystique, and the root of it -- the abysmal education of parents, peers, and the insidious media -- most of all his own hormonal pulls.

This doesn't have much to do with women, though. It's a vagueness of identity that's the problem. People believe, understandably, what's required of them to adapt to society early in life. To be free, what they need to get a handle of is the tendency to be owned and defined by society.

You as a man may decide to avoid whatever it is you are avoiding through shunning 'intimacy', and I guess you are in some august company. Many Christian mystics, many of the Hindus, I guess the Buddhists too, take the route of avoiding, and I guess they derive some benefit from it, or think they do. In my tradition though (not that I am a practitioner of it per se), it is not an option unless you are queer. Whatever you choose to do, you-singular or you as woman-avoiding group, is just fine and dandy, but you have no solid base for believing that it is 'necessary', required, and have no base to represent it or recommend it as a viable option. An individual can of course make any choice he wants, but when it comes to proscribing behavior, well, that's another game altogether.

'To be owned by the feminine mystique'.

Most ideas, even if they turn out to be lopsided or generally fallacious, have some merit, some connection to merit in them. Yes, I think I understand what you mean about this 'feminine mystique', and who wants to be 'owned' by anything or anyone. I suppose that if you were a Jungian you would say that a man needs to grow to the point he is not captured by the anima he projects, and that bedevils him at every turn? I get the sense that you are talking mostly of a psychological dependancy, and less perhaps of satisfaction of physical needs. You seem also to be talking of a 'media culture' that plays this dependency up? Caters to it, seduces? I could agree with you that those are traps that need to be and can be avoided.

I am not so sure though that avoiding the whole issue---thinking that there is something one is getting or will get---is at all the right course. True, an individal can make any choice for any period of time. But there is no sound reason why you or me or anyone who writes on this list cannot and should not have 'intimate' relationships with women. I will agree with you that so many women in our culture are very costly in terms of energy, money and time. I have avoided that one through living in South America where, as I said, I can call the shots, and I prefer it that way. (You really owe something to Germaine Greer for that phrase 'owned by the feminine mystique')

Strangely enough, as I think of my own self, I couldn't lie and say that I did not come under the influence of this mysterious 'feminine mystique', indeed I chased it, invoked it, always wanted to bring it in closer. But never did it own me. I don't think it owning me is an option. On the other hand, I provide a place for a woman, provide structure, and though that is not necessarily 'owning' it is a different relationship than a symbiosis or a dependency.

The hard part is letting go of persons, female persons, because if you don't want to be owned by you also cannot own.

You guys are always alluding to this monk-like equipoise. Since I don't have the time right now to read the Recommended Literature and glean the wisdom therein, I sure wish someone would expound a little on the Doctrines I clearly haven't mastered yet...

"The rest of your musings, while somewhat interesting, are rather vague."

Well, those musings are what I see when I look out over the multitudes. I am not sure if this 'vagueness' can be clarifiedand sharpened, or if you think that what I am seeing is incorrect.

Ataraxia,

The views I expressed were surely informed by a great deal of leftist discourses: all the known suspects. But to note those controlling and defining influences (media, PR agencies, the culture of the corporation) is not necessarily to stand in pro of the supposed alternatives: socialism, Fabianism, what-have-you. The 'alternative' might be simply a vital civil culture that had not had the grand corporation set on it. The alternative may be (though it is impossible) the conditions of society before the advent of such an unforeseen force (unforeseen by the Founders of the US).

There will always be a master of one stripe or another coming along...our Tragic battle is to resist them, or maybe it is to sail along with them, I really don't know.

Alex Jacob wrote:The 'alternative' might be simply a vital civil culture that had not had the grand corporation set on it. The alternative may be (though it is impossible) the conditions of society before the advent of such an unforeseen force (unforeseen by the Founders of the US).

The grand corportation you're talking about was alive and well in some form at the founding of the country and well before. It may morph certain aspects as time passes and it's different from culture to culture, but in effect, it is the culture. There's nothing actually wrong with it. You can be part of the culture and still be free from it.

I hate to state the obvious here, but you need to define what a "real man" is to answer those questions. You're free to define it as you see fit, of course. My view is somewhat cursorily summed up in an editorial from Genius News.

- What it means to be a real Man -

Both historical and contemporary literature, though the latter being of a more confused and imprecise nature, is replete with notions of what it means to be a man in any given society. However, if being a man in any of these schemas means anything remotely less than being an entity deeply infused with the will to express true individuality and to stand naked before Reality with the utmost sense of truth and integrity, then I cannot conceive of such a being as a man at all.

To what end is a man truly a man if he is not fully himself? In what possible sense is a man truly a man if he cannot stand before Reality as an individual and declare "I am what I am."? Is it enough that he is a father, a husband, a lawmaker and jurist, a provider and a protector? Is it enough that he is willing to sacrifice himself, in every possible sense, for a society that is grounded in egotism and falsity? Hardly. For a man to truly stand before reality as an individual he must first aspire to an understanding of that reality, otherwise he stands nowhere but knee-deep in muck.

Wisdom is the true destiny and completion of man. Man is incomplete without it. It is part of the nature of consciousness that it seeks to fulfill itself (i.e. to be certain about those things from which certainty may be gleaned), and to the degree that any given person is conscious, to that degree he will aspire to truth because he suffers for his ignorance - his lack of completion.

Unfortunately, certain intellectual and social forces have conspired to strip modern society and modern man of all its ideality. No longer is any such completion, such certainty, deemed possible, therefore man is left in psychological and spiritual limbo, the social effects of which are all too obvious - the increased feminisation of both society and man, the embracing of mediocrity and the democratic pragamtism associated with it, increased male youth suicide, the dimunition of masculine influence in the lives of young people.

Yet, as socially damaging as all these effects may be, nevertheless the true man has the capacity to stand apart from it all and strive for the completion of his own individual self. His duty to himself, if not any other, is to embrace his reason, take heed of his conscience and realise that the continual existential crisis he finds himself in can never be truly abated without the fulfillment of the natural destiny of that consciousness.

The forces of modern society lure man to find himself outside of himself, outside of mind and contemplation. This is madness, as the only thing that can authentically take a man outside of himself is if he is reborn as a woman. To my horror, more and more men are seemingly thus being reborn.

xerox wrote:For the most difficult obstacle to overcome here is to stop men getting in the way of letting females transcend the limitations of gender behaviour. Same goes for woman getting in the way of man.

Good point. Women are in the best position to understand women, and men in the best position to understand men - but even at that, each person's path is unique. Each gender can give the opposite gender a different perspective on things which may or may not be helpful, but insisting on a path that is wrong for that individual is damaging - no matter how good the intentions were.